Sheraton Vistana Villages

We have been guest in this beautiful resort. We had some complains regarding the WI-Fi not always in full strength. It is in a great location, close to so many centers and parks. We come without children and have ton's to do. The staff is very accommodating. We left on Christmas day but we enjoy seeing the activities for the children Christmas Eve. Everybody seem to have fun.

I had owned here for nearly 9 years. The service and cleanliness has gone way down and certainly for the price from the resort - NO WAY IS IT WORTH IT! If you are going to buy... buy resale!

The staff here was very friendly from the begging of our stay until the very end. Based on other reviews I requested for a room to be in the Lakes section of the complex as it had been renovated. Unfortunately I was told that I would they had a room for me in the Cascades section. When I mentioned my preference for a renovated room they assured me that units 1 thru ( I believe 18) had been recently renovated and we would not be near any ongoing construction. I was given a first floor 2 br villa in unit 12 and I must say I could not have been happier. The room was spacious, clean and more than I could have hoped for. We had a king size bed w/ Jacuzzi tub and a full shower for our bedroom. The second bedroom had 2 full beds (which could have slept 4 mid to average size kids) with an access door to its own bathroom that was very spacious as well. That bathroom had a shower and another door that opened out to the living area. We mostly ate at the counter between the kitchen and dining room but the table was big enough to fit 6 easily. The couch was fairly comfortable and could have been pulled out to accommodate 2 more people. Both rooms had decent sized LCD TV’s as well as a (40”?) LCD TV in the living room. The porch had a sliding glass door from the licing room or a door from the master bedroom. All the porches were screened which was nice.

Short of a few essentials like shampoo, etc the room had what we needed. We were called a few times throughout our stay, but not once did the phone ring. The calls all went to voice mail and most of them were informing us of different events they had going on along with specials on their rip slide water slide they had. Only 1 time when my wife went in to ask about the shampoo and other little items was she informed to see guest relations to pick up the items. At guest relations she could then register for a 1 hr meeting which they would supply a breakfast and either tickets or discounted tickets to the area parks. Since I already purchased all the tickets we needed prior to coming down and was not looking to purchase we went to a local Walgreens and purchased the few items we needed.

The pools in Cascade and Fountains were big ( never really crowded while we were there) and very nice. We found the whole property to be clean and everyone to be friendly. The resort is only a few miles from any of the Disney Parks and about 6 or 7 miles from the Universal Parks. If you do not have little ones I highly recommend Universal Islands of Adventure. It is the newest and offers the most for people of all ages.

I would definitely recommend this place to family and friends as well as redweek.com, and I will keep this place in mind for our return trip in the future.

Re: JohnM's post above.

Vistana Villages has mandatory phases and voluntary phases for staroptions.

Bella and Key West are the ONLY mandatory phases - staroptions transfer with resale. ALL OTHER phases are voluntary. STAROPTIONS DO NOT TRANSFER ON RESALE in these phases. (any except Bella and Key West phases as noted above)

I just wanted to clarify so no one bought with mistaken expectations.

We just returned from a week long trip at The Villages. We own at two different resorts and trade frequently. We were disappointed by our recent stay. I confirmed with two different people to have a pull out bed ready for our late arrival so the kids could get to sleep. It was not there, along with the other items we had pre arranged (including the groceries for next morning's breakfast). 45 minutes and two phone calls later, the bed arrived. It was too late to determine the whereabouts of our food and other supplies we had arranged. We had to wait until the office was opened in the morning. They never did find our order for groceries, although I had a confirmation #. The construction noise was so loud at times, we couldn't hear the TV. The pool is old and dirty. We waited 45 minutes for a pizza in the grill while the rest of the family ate their food....we waited for a pizza that turned out to be not worth waiting for. But the part that was the most irritating was the "spring break" like attitude at the pool and grill. The kareoke was so loud one night at 10:30pm coming from across the pool that it was waking our kids. The Dj at the pool during the day had the speakers and microphone turned up so loud, if you were in your villa it was as if they were standing in our bathroom, singing. All this for the three lone people at the pool.... After spending hours at Disney the only thing we wanted to do at out villa was have a couple of hours of peace and quite and perhaps take a nap. This was all but possible. We will not be giving our options away for this one again...